Kentucky legislation shielding doctors and other health providers from criminal liability was written broadly enough to apply to in vitro fertilization services, a Republican lawmaker said Friday as the bill won final passage.
The measure, which now goes to Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear, would accomplish what other bills sought to do to safeguard access to IVF services, GOP state Sen. Whitney Westerfield said in an interview. The other bills have made no progress in Kentucky’s GOP supermajority legislature with only a few days left in this year’s session.
Westerfield, an abortion opponent who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, said during the 37-0 Senate roll call vote that the bill’s definition of health care providers was broad enough to apply to IVF services.
“It was important to me to make that clear that providers can do what they do every day, and what moms and dads are counting on them to do every day to provide their services without fear of being prosecuted unduly,” Westerfield said in the interview afterward. “And I feel confident the bill is going to do that.”
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